


Every String You Play

by chucks_prophet



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Neighbors, Ambiguous/Open Ending, Angst and Humor, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Angst with a Happy Ending, Big Brother Gabriel, Castiel and Dean Winchester are Neighbors, Clumsy Castiel, College Student Castiel, Dean Plays Guitar, First Meetings, Humor, Inspired By Tumblr, Inspired by Music, M/M, Musician Dean, Neighbors, Smart Dean
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-11
Updated: 2016-03-11
Packaged: 2018-05-26 03:08:28
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,552
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6221146
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chucks_prophet/pseuds/chucks_prophet
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“This was my room too, you know.” He pauses, setting his hand on the trunk of his dwarfish figure. “Although, when I was in here, I was doing a whole lot more than voyeurism.”</p><p>For once, Castiel actually prays to be suffocated by math’s unyielding grip as he mumbles through a cherry red face, “That’s not what I’ve been doing.”</p><p>He can’t see, but Gabriel’s slanted smile turns into a pitchfork. “Does my baby bro have a crush on the D in Apartment 23?”</p>
            </blockquote>





	Every String You Play

**Author's Note:**

> Based on this prompt from otpprompts.tumblr.com:
> 
> Imagine your OTP as neighbors. A tends to sing at night and normally B would complain but their voice is really nice and they often find themselves comforted by it. One day, A’s songs start becoming more and more depressed and sometimes they’d stop because they were crying. B gets worried and starts talking to A to cheer them up/find out what’s wrong. Turns out A’s partner cheated on them/family member died/whatever and they’d started feeling a little depressed. A and B become close friends and after a while, A starts singing love songs at night.

“Cas, you know there are easier places to get your peep on, right?”

Castiel’s head _clunks_ against his wall like the rubber ball of a child playing solitary foursquare. “Oh my God, Gabe,” he bemoans, burying his newly aching head in the cover of his textbook, “you know there are easier ways to enter someone’s room—knocking, for instance.”

“This _was_ my room too, you know.” He pauses, setting his hand on the trunk of his dwarfish figure. “Although, when I was in here, I was doing a whole lot more than voyeurism.”

For once, Castiel actually prays to be suffocated by math’s unyielding grip as he mumbles through a cherry red face, “That’s not what I’ve been doing.”

He can’t see, but Gabriel’s slanted smile turns into a pitchfork. “Does my baby bro have a crush on the _D_ in Apartment 23?”

Castiel lifts his head. _“D?”_ he asks, unable to refrain from scrambling into an upright position. “That’s his name? You know his name? How do you know his name?”

“Cas, I wasn’t born here a few weeks ago, you know,” he laughs, stepping into his room. The walls are dressed in ranch and the smell of uncapped, abandoned mayonnaise is an unfortunate side effect of moving in with the brother only five years his senior. “His name’s Dean. He’s a guitarist or some shit, that’s all I know. The guy never leaves his apartment long enough to file a noise complaint.”

“He’s not _that_ loud.”

“Yeah, well, he plays electric too, so be warned if you stick your ear to that wall again.”

Gabriel leaves his room, leaving Cas to stalk (if you could even call it that, _really_ ) his neighbor through the thin layer of plaster dividing their rooms. Judging by the methodic finger picking and the dreamscape vocals, it can’t be anything other than “Every Breath You Take” by The Police.

Like any good musician, his voice is its own instrument. Dean’s a tenor with the horn open. Rough, but raw enough for a mallet to descend his xylophone spine.

The music comes to a screeching halt, and he swears he hears Dean muffle a few curse words before he picks up on another tune. Unlike the more prosaic pieces he’s played—romanticized only by his fit-for-country crooning—this one harnesses a longing that’s almost enough to make Cas turn away in guilt.

But like a moth drawn to a flaming guitar, Dean wrangled a groupie, so Cas presses closer to the wall.

_“I'm never gonna dance again_

_Guilty feet have got no rhythm_

_Though it's easy to pretend_

_I know you’re not a fool…”_

Cas frowns, cracking his book open. Maybe he should touch up on the midpoint method.

***

The next week isn’t any better.

That goes for his front and the Dean front. Today, Cas was faced with the possibility he won’t pass math. Granted he stopped studying around the time he heard Dean’s angelic (or satanic, depending on who you asked) voice, he didn’t exactly get hit with the news by the local paperboy, but it didn’t lessen the nagging self-hatred keeping him up at night.

Tonight, on the Dean front, his songs got worse. Not that anything he plays could sound _bad,_ so to speak, but the quality lost its stamina, too. One song, his voice wavered so bad he stopped playing entirely. The next thing Cas heard was the _thump_ of his acoustic before he burst into chest-heaving sobs.

The recording played on loop long after Dean plotted to another room:

 

_“I have to block out thoughts of you so I don't lose my head._

_They're crawling like a cockroach leaving babies in my bed._

_Dropping little reels of tape to remind me that I'm alone,_

_Playing movies in my head that make a porno feel like home…”_

***

Cas nearly trips over the staircase on the way to the pavement outside the apartment—and not because of his stereotypically and oftentimes plain inanely clumsy ways.

In front of him is a sex god—no, scratch that, sex _pagan_ , there’s no way just anyone can tap that without a hefty bargaining chip. He has light brown hair, short enough to style like a teepee perched on a slope. His back muscles, hidden underneath two layers of grunge era-modesty, are wide enough to pry open with the tips of his fingers, and scattered on the underside of his arms like pollen during summertime are freckles—angel kisses, if you will. There’s a swagger to his step that would make John Wayne question his manhood.

Cas’s eyes return to his head, and that’s when he notices the thin white wire connecting both his ears.

“Hey,” Cas calls halfway down the steps. The suspect in question isn’t exactly bobbing to the music, but it’s clear he’s immersed in it. “Dean?” he asks, lunging out to grab his left shoulder.

Except the other man’s faster, and before Cas knows it, his body is thrown at the foot of the stairs. Luckily, he has a few ridiculously large softbound textbooks to catch his fall rather than his backpack or he’d be dead.

“Oh my God!” he hears a low voice curse as Cas’s armpits are overwhelmed by the feeling of something calloused and warm. Only when there’s a hand on _his_ shoulder does Cas look up. “Are you okay?”

 _Fatal_ mistake—with a capital F. The front of the guy is even more breath-taking than the back. Freckles align like constellations around his nose and underneath a squared and lightly stubbled jaw. His eyes, which are as wide as the circumference of the throbbing in his knees, are painted an earthly green. And those lips. The things that pretty pink mouth could be doing besides talking at Cas.

“Yeah…” He manages through weakness not entirely caused by his near-premature death. “I was just… trying to get your attention.”

“What?”

Cas rolls his eyes before shucking Freckles’ hand off his shoulder to pluck out his earbuds. “I was trying to get your attention, jackass.”

“Oh…” Freckles’ says, blushing. “Sorry. I love music.”

“I gathered,” Cas sighs, standing up to brush dirt off himself. Through pursed lips and eyes, he catches the sight of Freckles’ _Police_ shirt. “Oh my God, I knew it was you.”

It’s Dean’s turn to narrow his eyes. “Hey man, not for nothing, but the last person who used that line on me… I woke up shackled to a bathroom stall in Vegas.”

“No, no,” Cas laughs, “I’m Cas, I just moved in with Gabe.”

Dean’s expression doesn’t change. “Gabe?”

“Wow, you really _do_ love music, Dean,” Cas scoffs, bringing his lightly scraped elbows at a 120 degree bend. “You know, Gabe, your neighbor for the past _year and a half._ I’m his brother, Cas.”

“How do you know my name?”

“Word of mouth. Gabe’s the complex manager.”

“Oh cool,” Dean says warily as his hand flies to his neck, “um… you’re not gonna file a complaint, are you?”

Cas’s eyes shoot open like a ten-year coma patient, “Are you kidding? I’m the only reason Gabe’s not taking any action. I kinda love the stuff you play.” He pauses when he sees Dean’s lips slowly unfold like a fresh cut, “I mean I don’t _stalk_ you or anything. It’s just, you know, something I overhear. I haven’t heard most of the songs you play before, but coming from you, they sound so—”

“Wait _what?!”_ Dean blasphemes, using little effort not to gawk, “Creedence Clearwater Revival? Deep Purple? The Police?” Cas shakes his head. “Holy crap, man. That’s just unacceptable. We have to fix that.”

Cas grins. “What do you have in mind?”

“What time do you come home?”

“Three.”

“That’s it,” Dean decides, “Jam session at my place tonight. Be there or be an H-bomb.” Cas just shakes his head again. Dean throws his arms up. “You’re killin’ me, Novak!”

“How do you know my last name?” Cas asks.

Dean supplies a panty-throwing grin and says, “You’re not the only stalker around here.”

***

“What do you _mean_ you haven’t binged the Batman movies??”

“I’m more of a Superman kind of guy.”

“Why would _anyone_ be a Superman fanboy? _Man of Steel_ made _Sucker Punch_ look like a freaking godsend.”

“I have a few words for you,” Cas says after bringing his sudsy Blue Moon to his lips, “Henry Cavill in tights.”

Dean nearly stubs his socked toe on his amp. He’s half-starfished on the floor across from Cas, leaning on his flimsy, finger-spotted coffee table for support. Somehow, he got down to one layer of clothing (fortunately, another long-sleeve flannel, this one purple, or Cas’s heart would be struggling to keep up with his raging hormones), and even that’s riding up to expose a thin member of flesh too cooked for any beast of nature. “Okay, alright,” he says, coming off a laugh that’s a drug in itself, “you win, but that was _four_ words.”

Cas shoves him lightly on the shoulder. Dean’s drunk enough to fall with it, laughing even harder. Creedence Clearwater Revival’s “Have You Ever Seen the Rain?” bleeds into the slightly smelly air with that steady _sha-sha_ drumline and stressed vocals, and Cas finds comfort in it—in all of it. Everything is so…comfortable, unlike being holed up in his 10x10 practicing algorithms.

Dean sits up again, crouched over his guitar and Cas. “You’ve got a little…” His finger traces a sticky spot on the far side of his cheek. Cas may be tipsy, but he certainly is conscious enough not to lean into the embrace. Even if Dean is warm— _especially_ if he’s warm. “How did you manage that?” he giggles.

“I dunno,” Cas says, followed by a crisp hiccup, “I managed to start failing math because of you, so I guess anything’s possible when it comes to the likes of me.”

Dean’s Adam’s apple sops up the last swig of alcohol and stops in the middle of his throat. “What?”

“Well, I mean, s’not like you’re loud enough to hear,” Cas says, slurring his words, “but your voice s’like harp strings on my naughty parts, you know, you just—”

“Cas,” Dean interrupts, grabbing his arm, “you have to take control, man. I don’t mind you listening to me—hell, I’ll freaking _tutor_ you—I just don’t want to be the reason you don’t get a shot at college, capishe?”

Cas nods solemnly. “I capishe.” He pauses. “Why do I get the sense you’re speaking out of experience?”

“Because I am,” Dean admits, leaning back on his arms. Dean pauses, measuring his words with the flick of his tongue. “One day, my dad asked me to drive him to the bank, told me to drop him off at the station. Well, I did, and when I got back, his wallet fell outta his coat pocket. I asked him, ‘Where’s the receipt?’ and he looks at me with this glassed-over expression. I come to find out it’s ten thousand leagues under the casino. That was my baby brother’s college fund.”

Something inside Cas’s stomach protests louder than the people outside Dean’s window. “I’m so sorry, Dean. If I had known that was the reason you started playing all those sad songs—”

“That’s not the only reason.”

“What?”

Dean angles his head to the floor this time he speaks, “My best friend, Benny, we’re not on very good terms right now—actually, we’re not on _any_ terms. At all. I, uh, I got with his cousin, Liz, cos neither of us could wait to jump in the sack.” A small laugh escapes him that holds no mirth. “One day, Benny asks me to take him to a prostate exam. I don’t tell him I’m having a playdate with his cousin, so I feed him a little white lie. He takes the bus, comes here a few days later, finds me in bed with Liz, and tells me he has cancer.”

Cas hates the way he’s probably looking at Dean—scratch that, _oogling_ —but he can’t help himself. Here he is, at the house of a guy he knows by very _loose_ association, and all Cas is doing is staring at him like a dog robbed of his daily walk.

Instead of adding an inch or two to Dean’s frown, Cas gestures to his Fender and asks, “What’s your favorite song to play?”

Lamely, Dean scoffs, “Cas, I think you should leave.”

“Not without hearing it,” Cas protests, handing him his pick. “Go on.”

The Earth is made when Cas’s blue eyes meet Dean’s green. Dean accepts the pick, smiling softly. “Okay, but fair warning, if I have to tell you what song this is, I might throw something at you.”

Dean leans forward, test strumming before running through a single chord. E, followed by D, A, lather, rinse, repeat, until it goes on a tangent of chords Cas can’t be bothered with naming to save his life.

“‘Back in Black’,” Cas says, grinning with an knowing finger. “You _have_ to teach me that.”

Dean hides a bigger smile in the pocket of his flannel. “Okay.”

Cas stays the night.

***

That’s not the first and certainly not the last time Cas stays the night at Dean’s. In fact, their dates become so frequent, Dean starts spending the night at Cas’s (much to Gabriel’s chagrin). Eventually, after two months, they become comfortable enough to sleep in the same bed (that and Gabe threatened to trash Dean’s place even more than it already is if he walked out of his room to the sight of him half-naked one more time).

Their first kiss isn’t until month three. It starts so slow and tentative and stays that way for another month.

But before any of that happens—at more like _week_ three—there’s a not-so tentative knock at his door. Actually, knock is too subtle a word. It’s more like a … a _bang_.

_“Hey, I hear the voice of a preacher from the back room_

_Calling my name and I follow just to find you;_

_I trace the faith to a broken down television and put on the weather…”_

Cas stumbles out of bed and pries the curtains open. There, on his porch step facing him is Dean with his Fender and portable amp, singing loud enough to set off a few car alarms.

_“While my friends were getting high and chasing girls down parkway lines,_

_I was losing my mind because the love, the love, the love, the love, the love_

_That I gave wasted on a nice face…”_

Cas nearly breaks his face grinning so hard. He should really put a stop to this.

_“In a blaze of fear I put a helmet on a helmet,_

_Counting seconds through the night and got carried away,_

_So now I'm standing on the overpass screaming at the cars,_

**_‘Hey,_ **

_I wanna get better!’”_

And yes, he does scream that last part. Then his clean-shaven face scrunches when Cas holds up a sign scribbled on light green construction paper that reads: _Me too._

_“I didn’t know I was lonely 'til I saw your face._

_I wanna get better, better, better, better,_

_I wanna get better._

_I didn't know I was broken 'til I wanted to change._

_I wanna get better, better, better, better,_

_I wanna get better…”_

**Author's Note:**

> Songs referenced indirectly:  
> "Careless Whisper" by Wham!  
> "Hate Me" by Blue October  
> "I Wanna Get Better" by Bleachers


End file.
